Sarah D'Almeida - Dying by the Sword

Though he had been raised for the monastery, and the soft work of reading the scriptures, preaching, and perhaps writing his own interpretations of it, Aramis had for years now been living by the sword-which is to say by his agility and his strength too. In battle and on guard, and occasionally when he took the holy scriptures to the poor blighted souls who were female and insufficiently able to elude the guard of brothers or husbands, he had often had to lift heavy weights, climb up or down trellises, swing himself from balconies and other feats that demanded one cultivate muscles, as well as brains and piety.

Now his muscles would serve him well, or he would break himself trying. Bracing his feet, he put his now bruised shoulder up once more, and up against the lid of the box. He pushed, as hard as he could, continuously. For a moment he thought the lid was giving, but then he realized that it was his shoulder that had slipped against the wood.

Gritting his teeth, moving around with small movements, he started to turn himself completely around. It had occurred to him that while his back and his shoulders were strong, his legs had carried him about the length of Paris for several years now, several times a day. And their agility and strength had seen him through several duels. He should be able to break this box with his feet, if his shoulder wouldn’t operate.

“Oh, listen, Marc, it sounds like he’s slithering around inside the box.”

“I’m sure he is, Jean. He’s trying to crawl out the keyhole.”

The first comedian rapped sharply on the box lid. “Eh, Pierre! You’ll have to lose quite a bit of weight to fit through that hole.”

“Oh, I’m sure there’s a part of him that would fit. If Marie is right, it’s not that big.”

Right, Aramis thought, and pulled his knees as close to his chest as he could, to give his feet as much chance of hitting the lid with force as could be hoped for. It wasn’t as much as he would like to employ, since the space inside the box allowed for very little movement, but all the same, he tried, and pulled back all the way and then he kicked out, with all his might.

The lid of the box splintered under the soles of his boots, the two rustics yelled and rose from what appeared to be a bench seat up front, and Aramis, completely conscious of being at a disadvantage, jumped out of the box and landed on his feet.

He realized he was standing on an oxcart proceeding at a bucolic pace through a landscape of fields and trees. He also realized that his blond, wavy hair, having come completely loose from its bind, was hiding most of his face. He pulled it back, with his fingers, and turned a very angry face onto his captors.

They were portly middle-aged man, attired in the clothes of peasants. And they seemed to be trying to figure out a way to jump off the cart-which was easier said than done, as they were hemmed in by the bench at which they’d been sitting, the box in which Aramis had been, and the oxen. One of them, looking over his shoulder, looked about ready to vault over the oxen.

But the other one had the presence of mind to pull off his hat, and to bow in an awkward, if willing, way. “Your worship,” he said. “Oh, Lord help me, your worship. We didn’t know it was you. We thought it was our friend Pierre.”

Through gritted teeth, Aramis said. “Only because you refused to listen.”

“Yes, your worship. That’s us all over. I’m always telling Marc here as we’re too stubborn for our own goods and one day we’ll come a cropper, won’t we, Marc? But you see, Marc’s sister, Marie, she is with child by Pierre, who came to the country some time ago when his father… but that matters not. He came to the country, and he left Marie with child, and it is said he intends to marry a hussy, as works in the palace of the King. And we thought to ourselves, we thought-if we just go into Paris and grab Pierre, we’ll make him see the error of his ways, and he won’t leave until he’s married Marie all right and tight, see?”

Now Marc too was regarding Aramis with a faintly hopeful air and a completely maniacal grin, and holding his hat, squashed, in his blunt-fingered hand. “You can’t refuse to acknowledge,” Marc said, “that a brother should love his sister, can you?”

Aramis, eyes blazing, was quite beyond controlling his tongue. “No, but I do think perhaps if your ancestors had indulged in a little less of that, you’d have been able to understand my words before now, wouldn’t you?” And seeing Marc’s mouth open. “And for the love of heaven, don’t call me worship and don’t agree with me or I shall not be responsible for my actions.”

The sad thing was that though his bruised shoulder still hurt like the blazes, and though he felt as though he’d dislocated something moving about in that infernal box, he found the complete and unredeemable cowardice of the two of them very funny indeed. And if he let himself go, he would start to giggle and guffaw, which could not possibly happen. So he spoke through gritted teeth that, they weren’t to know, were being held together against laughter. “Do you still have some wine? And some bread? I haven’t eaten since yesterday. And turn this infernal cart around and take me back home.”

Jean, or perhaps Marc, resumed his place on the bench of the driver, and started executing what seemed to be a complex maneuver of pulling the reins this way and that. It had absolutely no visible effect, and eventually his comrade got tired and said, “Jean, wait. I’ll dispose his… I mean… this person… I mean, Monsieur…”

“Aramis.”

“Monsieur Aramis,” Marc said, not even bothering to enquire the provenance of such a strange name. “I’ll dispose Monsieur Aramis with something to eat, and then I’ll help you turn the animals around, for you know it’s going to take a rod on their noses. A more stubborn couple I never met, if very reliable.”

Moments later, Aramis, sitting down with a linen napkin-procured from the depths of another box and surprisingly very clean-on his knees, was the sole proprietor of the delights of good dark bread, a glass full of wine that, from wherever it had come, was much better than even Athos’s vintage, and a handful of dried figs. As hungry as he was, this seemed to him like a banquet from the gods. And as for the spectacle of watching the two men trying to turn around oxen that were fully as stubborn as they were, it was doubtless as good as anything the theater had to offer.

Aramis, having also found his sword and his lost hat at the bottom of the cart, was starting to feel very much like himself again. So much so that, when the men had accomplished their purpose of getting the oxen turned around, he’d had time to think of how to take advantage of this very strange situation. He must talk to them. If Pierre was Pierre Langelier, and Aramis was almost sure he was, then Aramis would be able to find out more about the man, more about what interested him, and more about what might have caused the murder of the armorer than he would have otherwise been able to find out.

So when they took their place back on the bench, he said, “So, you took the oxen all the way into Paris?” he was marveling at the feat of logistics, since most streets in Paris were not wide enough for a carriage, much less a broad oxcart. And the idea of having to turn the oxen at close confines, even in a main street, caused Aramis to shudder.

They shook their heads. “No, your musketeerness,” Jean said. “We left it with my cousin, just on the outskirts, you know… And we went into the city on our own.”

He gave them an appraising look. “And you carried me out in that box by the force of your arms?” They looked sturdy enough, but not that strong. From where they’d been to the outskirts of Paris it would have taken at least an hour’s walk and maybe more.